First Few Days in Santa Barbara, CA

Sunset at the Breakwater in Santa Barbara, California

I flew into Santa Barbara on Friday afternoon, and dad, Carol, and I walked State Street for the afternoon / evening (after dinner of curried meat and rice). We went to Yogertland where I proceeded to fill my own cup with double-chocolate Oreo yougert (one of about 12 favors) and added my own toppings...brownie bites, caramel, and fidge sauce- yum!

My brother Jonothan drove up from Westminster, CA on Sunday evening. Dad had to work on Monday, and Carol, Jonathan, and I sat all day and watched movies and played Mario Party and Super Mario Bros. it was nice and relaxing! Tuesday Jonathan and I went Christmas shopping.


The new Santa Barbara airport!

Today Elizabeth and her boyfriend Logan flew in from New Hampshire. Santa Barbara has a new airport since I last flew in in 2009, and it is beautiful! This afternoon the family and a few of Elizabeth and Jonathan's friends went down to the Breakwater to walk along the beach it was beautiful out. As we walked back to the car about an hour later, the sun was setting.

Jonathan on the rocks at the Breakwater

Walking along the Breakwater

 

I only walked along the wood beam partially because I have this issue with short heights...then I had to hop down the rocks back to the beach to walk the rest of the way...rock hopping, no problem! :)



The family with the shoreline in the



Dad and I a the end of the Breakwater




The siblings at the Breakwater with the wharf in the background

 

 We returned home and had tacos for dinner and are now watching Source Code.



The walk back to the car at sunset (Logan and Elizabeth and Dad and Carol)

Port Campbell to Portland, Great Ocean Road, Australia

London Bridge

The Arch

Today was a shorter day than we expected, but that turned out well in the end.  We left Port Campbell fairly early in the morning thinking that all the stops we had planned for the day would take far longer than it actually did.  It ended up that all the stops between Port Campbell to Warnambool, where we were stopping to go to Tower Hill (an extinct volcano) only took about 10 minutes each!  So, we headed back out along the Great Ocean Road toward Portland making several stops along the way, hitting several lookouts.  Our final destination was Adelaide, but the majority of people who travel the GOR turn around at Port Campbell (we found out why nobody goes beyond Portland the next day!).  

Our first stop was The Arch. Even though it was very early, the day was already hot and humid (although at the time I thought it was humid, it cannot compare to Cairns!). Because the sun had not quite fully risen over the horizon, it was a beautiful view of the coastline to the west with the bright sun shining gold and orange and highlighting the cliffs’ orange rock and dirt. There was a misty haze over the water that made it look so pretty too!

View of the Grotto from above

Our next stop was London Bridge, which has fallen down (he, he, he).  The bridge fell in 1990, leaving two people stranded on the newly formed island pillar (they were there for several hours before a helicopter rescued them).  It was early enough in the morning that the sun was still leaving a golden light that gave us beautiful views of the rocks and cliffs; again, the mist over the ocean was beautiful.

Inside the Grotto cave

Next, we hit the Grotto, a small cave-like area that is being eaten away by the saltwater.  At the top of the cliff, the view was spectacular.  Standing near the edge looking out to the endless ocean and being surrounded by orange cliffs was very soothing so early in the morning.  From the cliff top, it was a few flights of stairs down to the ocean level where the “cave” is located.  It was cool and wet down there, and you could tell that when there was a high tide, the ocean waves crashed into the cave area and drenched it.  It was an interesting point-of-view to look through the hole that has been eroded away by the salt water and to look out to the ocean view.

Our final stop before going to Tower Hill was at the Bay of Martyrs (the site of the 'Falls of Halladale' shipwreck, which hit a reef in 1908 (all survived)) and the Bay of Islands (right next to each other on the walking path) in the Bay of Islands Coastal Park (32km of coastline). 











Again, the views of the coast and beaches were magnificent.  And, like the 12 Apostles, these areas are dotted with limestone pillars and islands that have formed from the erosion of the saltwater along the coast.  There was one particular stack that you could see the foundation being eroded by the waves, which was really cool.

From our final “beach” stop of the day, the road headed inland to Warnambool, where Caytie and I went to the Tower Hill Reserve, a park that has at its center an extinct volcano (last recorded eruption is 6,000 to 7,000 years ago) surrounded by flat marshes and lakes. 

Some of the vegetation was quite interesting.  One tree looked like it had pea pods hanging off of it.  Another tree had these yellowish-white blossoms that were pretty awesome.  We also got to see kangaroos (which never really got old)!  We did also see at Tower Hill one of the most prevalent birds we saw in all Australia (other than the cockatoos in Sydney):  the Australian Magpie, which makes such an unexplainable sound…it woke us at the crack of dawn when we camped in the Snowy Mountains!  Later, as we drove up and out of the “crater,” we also saw (very far away) emus! 

Emus in the field of the "Crater"

Me half way up the Peak Climb

View from the top of the Peak Climb, volcanic rock, and the ocean in the background

We decided to do the Peak Climb, which goes to the top of the tallest hill overlooking the volcano.  It was a brutal climb.  Short, but extremely steep (the pictures do not do it justice), and I was sweating by the time we were a quarter of the way to the top!  I took a few pictures of the crater of the former volcano, as well as the steep hill and the view from the top.  There is a piece of volcanic rock at the top of the hill.  The view was amazing; you could see to the ocean.

On the way up and out of the “crater,” we stopped off to take a picture of the rocks that had formed from the previous eruptions…pretty cool!

It was still morning when we left Tower Hill Reserve, and headed on to Portland.  We drove through a few small towns that had some beautiful, old stone churches. 

We ended up arriving in Portland in the early afternoon, which was great!  We checked into the motel, and headed to town!  We hit the Information Centre, and had lunch at the waterfront in a park.  Afterwards, we headed to the Laundromat.  It was wonderful to be able to relax while we got our cloths washed.  We hit the grocery store next door and resupplied on breakfast and lunch items.  We went back to the motel and vegged out for the evening, having dinner in.

Melbourne to Port Campbell, Australia, along the Great Ocean Road

Me at the Tweleve Apostles (facing 2 of the 9 that are left)

We were up early, early, early today due to city parking issues and not wanting to pay extra money. After our lovely middle-of-the-night fire drill, and getting up at 5 a.m., we were not exactly ready and raring to go this morning. We had gone to bed fairly early knowing that we were getting up early, so it wasn’t as bad as it could have been. One thing that I DID NOT enjoy was the lack of coffee! It was barely dawn (and mostly dark out) as we were leaving Melbourne, so we figured we’d make it to the Koala Café in plenty of time for breakfast!

The drive to the Koala Cove Café was much longer than originally thought. We got there at 9am…great for breakfast time, not so great for our hungry stomachs! Part of it was our own fault at we made a several stops at overlooks, the Memorial Arch, and two spontaneous hikes (one of which was to a waterfall) along the way. The lookouts were quick stops to take in the view, stretch our legs, and get a few pictures.

The hike down to The Gulch was short and well worth it. It was a short hike down to the beach, but the last little ways was all sand, and down a pretty steep hill. Again, it was well worth it as we had a beautiful, very large stretch of beach pretty much to ourselves! We did some walking, shell collecting, and writing in the sand!

The spot we were at was like a huge cove, with points jutting out to the right and left of us. The point to the right had a lighthouse on it. We gave no thought to the downhill walk in the sand when we were going to the beach, but going back up to the parking lot was pretty funny! The hill is steeper than it looks in the picture. I took it running, got to the top, and took the picture of Caytie trying to trudge her way up it!

The next stop was at the Great Ocean Road Memorial Arch. I’m going to diverge from my trip information, and give a little history of the GOR here. The GOR Trust was set up to raise funds and employ soldiers and sailors returning from WWI (where 64% of those ANZAC soldiers and sailors who had gone to war did not return) to dig out a costal route to link Melbourne and Adelaide, and to provide a beautiful drive to entice tourists to the region. Soldiers started work in August 1918 with surveying the road’s route. However, due to the difficult terrain, by March 1919, only 10 miles had been successfully pegged out. The first charge was detonated on September 19, 1919, and soldiers and sailors went to work with pick and shovel digging a 100-mile coastal road. During the 13-year construction period, nearly 3,000 returned soldiers labored on the GOR. The entire stretch of road from Geelong to Warranbool was completed on April 27, 1932. The GOR is the world’s largest war memorial, as it is dotted with numerous structures that honor the memory of those who lost their lives fighting in WWI and other wars.

OK, history lesson over. :) We stopped at the Arch to read the signs and get a few pictures. We continued on along the road, which hugged the curve of the coast. I pulled over at Cape Patton for another picture (surprise) of the coast. This was an awesome spot for a view of the long coast line.

Our final stop before breakfast was at Carisbrook Falls in the Great Otway National Park, the highest falls along the GOR (although the falls are not vertical, but fall along the rock side and down the mountain into the creek below). The hike was uphill to the falls, which is the kind of hike that I enjoy because then the way back is downhill! The walk was along the side of a hill on a path that had been dug out, following the Carisbrook Creek below. Being extremely hungry by this time, we didn’t linger too long at the falls before we hiked back to our car.

Our next stop was breakfast at the Koala Cove Café in Kennett River. Yummmm is about all I can say. Part of it, I’m sure, is that it was 9am by the time we got there, and I’d not eaten or had any coffee as of yet. But my breakfast (”Brekkie”) sandwich was AWESOME! English muffin, rasher bacon, egg, tomato, and “tomato sauce” equals delish! I was so hungry and it was so good, I think I ate it in about 2 minutes.

After about a half hour, we moved on to our next stop, Mait’s Rest Rainforest Walk. The walk was beautiful! It was mostly a shaded walk, with the sun poking through the canopy every once in a while. It was a fairly easy walk too, and only about 45 minutes long (with stops for pictures). There were very few people around, which was even better. We only came across two other groups on the whole walk!

There were giant ferns, along with Euclyaptus and giant Myrtle Beech trees towering over the ferns! The Myrtle Beech trees are some of the oldest trees in the area. The rainforest is inundated with trees, some of which were being reclaimed by the forest. I was even able to stand under a tree whose roots had (a sign told me) grown around a fallen tree, which then was reclaimed back into the land. It was thoroughly restful and beautiful time. Probably one of the most unique things we did/saw in Australia.
Next we headed to the Cape Otway Lightstation, especially since we were told at one of the Information centers that the drive down to it had tons of Koalas just hanging about in the trees. The drive down to the tip/coast where the lighthouse was at took about 45 minutes. It was a fairly narrow road (not as bad as McKillop’s Road, however) and tree lined. It was gorgeous!

We had planned to go to the lighthouse and take a short walk on the beach, but once we got there, we found out it was going to cost us $16 each to go to the lighthouse, so we passed. The 45 minute trip was not a waste of time, however, because on our way down, we saw some people pulled over to the side of the road with cameras out, pointed at the trees. That’s right, KOALAS! We saw about 20 between the two different stops on our way down, and it was so cool to see them in the wild!

Our next stop on our journey along the Great Ocean Road was at Gibson Steps. We decided not to go down the bazillion steps to the beach, but we went to the overlook and took a few pictures. Because we were so close to The 12 Apostles, we decided to do our walking around there. We didn’t realize, however, that there wasn’t any down-on-the-beach walking, it was all pathways built along the top of the cliffs overlooking the shoreline with views of The 12 Apostles (of which there are only 9 left standing).

The beaches all along the GOR were beautiful, but the ones around The 12 Apostles were especially beautiful and pristine. The 12 Apostles are limestone rocks sticking straight up out of the ocean, and they were awesome. The cliffs and rocks were a gorgeous yellow and the water itself was a beautiful royal and teal blue, depending on where you looked! We looked around, took some photos, and then decided that we had plenty of time to look at the other tourist spots between The 12 Apostles and Port Campbell (our hostel location, about 20 minutes away), and then come back at sunset to get some photos of The 12 Apostles then.

We drove about 500 meters down the GOR to the next parking lot and walked out to the Loch Ard Gorge. The Loch Ard was a ship that wrecked on the cliffs near Port Campbell in 1878 killing all but two of the passengers and crew due to a mist so heavy, they couldn’t see the lighthouse. The two survivors ended up washed up on shore in the gorge. Caytie and I read the signs about the wreck, and then took the stairs down to the beach. It was beautiful! The sand and cliffs were yellow, and the water a beautiful teal. We spent a short while on the beach taking photos and looking at the cave the survivors spent the night in, and then headed back up top.

From that same parking lot, we walked down a path towards Mutton Bird Island and Thunder Cave. We couldn’t get out to view the island because the path was closed off, but we could see it from the main path. Off one of the lookouts, we were also able to see back to the beach where we had stood (Loch Ard Gorge). The cave was similar to the beach in that it was between to juts of cliffs, but there was no sandy beach, only a cave where the water crashed into it making a really loud sound (hence the name, Thunder Cave).

By the end of all these walks (about 2 hours later), my foot was pretty sore. We decided to head on to Port Campbell and check into our hotel for a short rest and to have dinner. We found an extremely small grocery store and got some bread, fruit, and more PB&J. The place we were staying was a backpacker’s hostel. It was a house that had all the bedrooms with multiple bunks, 2 bathrooms, and a kitchen. We had a twin private because we hadn’t wanted to share with anyone, but we could have done one of the bunk rooms with the ocean view and been fine because there was NO ONE else there! It was great! After walking down the main street of the “town” to the grocery store and eating dinner (surprise, surprise…PB&J!), we headed back out to The 12 Apostles.

It was ABSOLUTELY BEAUTIFUL! It was misty out, and the reflection of the sunset in the mist was awesome! I’ll let the pictures speak for themselves!

We stayed to watch the sun go all the way down over the horizon, and we also got to see a beautiful moon rise with the sunset reflecting in the sky!

The ride home was in the dark, and I don’t think I have ever driven through so many bugs in my life! We could barely see out the windshield after the 20 minute drive back to the hostel!

Another beautiful shot of my swollen and purple foot!